Clio delivers comfort and fun
IT’S amazing that in many cars fitted with stop-start, the system doesn’t work when you put the gearbox into neutral and the handbrake on.
But the Highway Code suggests we should always do this when sitting in traffic. Hmm.
Also, with the very bright LED brake lights on so many cars now, keeping your foot on the footbrake blinds drivers behind, especially at night.
The diesel Renault Clio I drove a couple of weeks ago suffered from no such problem.
The stop-start was brilliant and never let me down, wheras in a couple of other cars recently, the system has stopped the engine just as I slowed down coming onto a roundabout and started to pull out.
The Clio I drove was the Dynamique S Nav, which sounds expensive at first, when the price tag reads £16,975.
But it comes with an excellent level of kit and drives beautifully. The combined economy figure is a heady 85mpg and that equates into a real road 55-plus mpg with fairly careful driving, which has to be excellent.
And when emissions are down at just 85 grammes per kilometre as well, running costs are just about as low as they can be.
I’ve liked this latest Clio ever since it came out and was delighted that the company went down the sensible route of not bothering with a three-door model.
Trying to get the kids in and out of one is a recipe for serious back trouble but many car makers still put them at the cheapest end of their ranges.
The ride is excellent over poor surfaces both at slow speeds and above 50mph. It just soaked up everything I threw at it with huge ease and is one of the most comfortable superminis on the market.
The road holding is also remarkably good for a normal family car with no sporting pretentions, safe and sure and allowing plenty of fun.